History of CASEwise Corporate Modeler

“But what I do have are very particular set of skills, skills I have acquired over a very long career.” - Liam Neeson, "Taken".

A question I am often asked is, “Do you miss work?” My answer is “I miss having my expertise used.”

Normally when people ask me what I used to do for a living I do NOT reply “I was mainly involved in systems development methodologies“. It is too hard to try and explain about Systems Development Life Cycle (SDLC) and project management frameworks (PRINCE2, DSDM, etc) and Computer Aided Software Engineering (CASE) tools.

Instead I would normally say, “I worked in IT, but more on the project management side. Or sometimes “My clients were mainly the IT departments of large companies who wanted to do a better job of developing systems “.

The core pillars my discipline were the trilogy of methods, tools and techniques. Every area of endeavour had its own software packages to support what they do and IT is no different hence CASE tools.

This one product, CASEwise Corporate Modeler, has been involved through a large part of my professional career providing me with gainful employment both on the payroll and as a freelancer. Prompted by a contact from a ex-colleague and the emergence of a historic document I feel compelled to tell the full story of this money earner.

The other parts of the trilogy - methods (Inforem method, CSC Catalyst, Novartis Crystal) and techniques (data modelling and process dynamics modelling) - probably deserve their own posts but here is not the place.

Prequel - pre 1989.

1982: Inforem founded by Ali Arthur, Sohail Amer and Mojtaba Ghassamian

1985: TAF (The Analysts Friend) This product supported recording entities, attributes and a simple functional / process hierarchy. Written in Pascal by some chap who was even older than us. He had grey hair! George Keeling thinks he was called Tim but has forgotten his surname. It had a text based interface. Database underlying it not known.

1986: Mark joins Inforem.

1988: PAGE (professional application generation environment). TAF was rewritten to run on Datafit’s DP4 database with a GEM front end.

1989: PAGEfit. Athar Sharif and Nalin Goonewardene conceive the idea of PAGEFit. An interface to generate a DP4 database schema from the entity relationship diagram. You could then build application screens using QAB (Quick Application Builder) using the generated database.

1989: Inforem start work on a new version of CASEwise that supports version control and uses the fledgling Windows 1.0. The project starts to overrun both timescales and budget.

1990: CSC (Computer Sciences Corporation) go on a global spending spree acquiring a number of companies around the world. It acquires Inforem and divests itself of CASEwise:

• Inforem employees become CSC employees in early 1990.
• George Keeling leaves CSC to set up CASEwise
• CSC transfers CASEwise IPR to George
• George abandons the ambitious spec for the product and writes a simpler, better version
• Mark McLellan becomes product manager ably supported by Steve Jarvis, Simon Curtis, and a woman whose name I cannot remember.
• George continued to refine and improve the product over the following years
• After Casewise was started, John Christian, who had worked at Inforem and was recommended by Bob Carlsen, was a vital programmer because he understood Windows and GEM, which George didn't. His work was vital for the transition from GEM to Windows.

1992: CASEwise has grown sufficiently to employ a help desk person. Mark hands over support and breathes a sigh of relief. He continues with CSC for another eight years.

Official History (1989-2000)

<quote>

The history of the CASEwise Corporate Modeler

The CASEwise Corporate Modeler was originally developed by the English consulting and methods company Inforem Plc in the middle 1980's.  The tool was known originally call "PAGE", then "PAGEFIT".  Inforem Plc was acquired by Computer Sciences Corporation (CSC) between 1989 and 1990.  They sold the rights to the tool to George Keeling, the founder and Chief Executive of CASEwise.

During the first year CASEwise continued to support existing customers until it's first product I-CASEware was launched as version 2.  This release, and versions 2.1 and 2.2 employed the Digital Research GEM graphics environment and employed the Datafit DP4 relational database.  Version 2.3 was offered in both  GEM and Microsoft Windows.

The name CASEwise as first used with version 3 in 1992 when the product became the CASEwise Modeler.  Direct access to the integrated repository was first offered in 1994 with version 4 along with simulation support for Dynamics diagrams and Microsoft Word reporting tools.  Version 4.1 was launched in 1995 with additional functionality.

CASEwise revised the model database repository structure when version 5 was released in 1996 providing support for controlling diagram appearance and style.  In 1997 CASEwise launched version 6 as the CASEwise Corporate Modeler 97 and CASEwise Corporate Modeler 98 was launched in 1998 with an internal version of 6.1.  Corporate Modeler 99 was made commercially available in quarter 2 of 1999.

The background of CASEwise

CASEwise Limited is a wholly owned subsidiary of CASEwise Systems Limited.  CASEwise Limited performs the sales, marketing, support and services function for none American business.  CASEwise Systems Limited performs the research and development function of CASEwise products.

CASEwise began trading as "CASEware Limited" during 1989/1990 after purchasing the intellectual property and source code from Computer Sciences Corporation (CSC) following its acquisition of the English consulting and methods company Inforem Plc during 1989/1990.  CASEware became CASEwise Systems Limited a couple of years later when it was discovered that CASEware was being used by other legitimate businesses in some national markets, including the US.

In 1993, CASEwise opened a sales, support and service subsidiary in the US, located in Boston, Massachusetts.  The Boston office is now supported by satellite offices spread across the US.

CASEwise Limited, and CASEwise Systems Limited, are British companies located at and trading from offices in Swiss Cottage, London.

CASEwise vision on describing and analysing of processes

The CASEwise mission statement clearly presents its vision for Process:

"CASEwise believes that understanding business processes lies at the heart of effective management. For this reason we develop tools for large and mid-sized enterprises to model business processes and use the resulting intelligence to increase efficiency and effectiveness.

Success will happen for CASEwise because we believe in:

• Striving for exceptional quality in product and service;
• Working very closely with customers to meet their needs;
• Respecting our colleagues with a view to sharing increased wealth, job security, self esteem and quality of work-life.

We believe this will result in increased shareholder value."

CASEwise, in 1990, was the first tool provider to offer support for Process Dynamics and has gained an enviable knowledge of that technique.  Process Dynamics is a Business Process Modelling technique and notation originally used decades ago by Organisation and Methods Analysts that predates Computers.  Testimony to this knowledge is CASEwise support for simulation and the support CASEwise provides its customers in learning to apply Process Dynamics to support Business Concept Modelling, Business System Design (Process Mapping) and Clerical Procedure (Work Instruction) production.

Scope and Market of CASEwise Corporate Modeler

The CASEwise Corporate Modeler is a Business Modelling tool supporting the study of Process, Organisation, Location, Data, Application and Technology.  The tool has a high bias towards Process and Data with mapping to the other four domains of study.

CASEwise has a philosophy of tool co-existence and consciously remains in the Business Modelling domain, preferring to link to best of breed lower CASE, IT Systems Design and Construction, tools.  This philosophy places the CASEwise Corporate Modeler 98 in a dominant position in the Business Modelling marketplace attracting business from consulting organisations, large organisations and government bodies world-wide.

CASEwise is committed to delivering Business Modelling related tools to support its customers.  To this end new and improved features are as a direct result of what our customers have asked us to do.  Important features and important customers receive a high priority within CASEwise often with rapid deployment.

The Generic Diagrammer, new in Corporate Modeler 98, was the CASEwise response to customers who wished to draw diagrams using their own notation and paradigm.  All the major modelling objects can be depicted using individual symbols.  This combines the integration of a repository with the flexibility offered by graphics tools.  The full impact of the Generic Diagrammer will be realised with the Corporate Modeler 2000 feature of user defined object types to provide complete user diagramming flexibility.

A key objective for CASEwise in the near future is to acquire the "Designed for Windows" logo accreditation from Microsoft Corporation. CASEwise plans two major version releases of the Corporate Modeler in the next two years: Corporate Modeler 99, with an internal version 6.2; and Corporate Modeler 2000, with an internal version 7.0.  Release of new features may occur outside of these versions. The important feature enhancements are described below:

Corporate Modeler 99

• A Shape Palette and Object Tree for easier diagramming.
• Combine Corporate Publisher and Corporate Publisher HTML into a single HTML offering complete customisation and report publication flexibility.
• Improved links to other tools.
• Greater support for ERP system reference modelling, e.g. SAP.

Corporate Modeler 2000

• Revised repository model database structure.
• Complete support for OLE and OLE Automation.
• Complete user definition of Menus, Dialog text, Objects, Associations and Properties.  The allows for methods and language customisation from a single application.
• New product paradigm with Repository Explorer offering Object outlining with a Tree control on the left and customisable workspace on the right.  Time-scales permitting the Repository Explorer and Diagram drawing space will be supported by a single workspace.

<end quote>

Postscript 1999-present.

1999: Mark takes voluntary redundancy from CSC and begins a new life as a freelance contractor. He names the company M&M Enterprises after Milo Minderbinder in Catch 22. His first two contracts are with Novartis Pharmaceuticals and then SwissRe - both keen methodology and CASEwise users. Other work includes three months acting as CASEwise's training department, installing the software on clients' sites and then training their staff.

Later release versions after CM2000 are as follows (as best we can recall):

• 2002: CM8e (2002)
• 2004-2005: CM9.0 - 9.3
• 2004-2006: CM10.0 - 10.2
• 2006-2007: CM10.3 - 10.3e, the first Oracle/SQL Server only release.
• 2008: CM2008
• 2009: CM2009
• 2011: CM2011
• ... and more

Significant components worthy of mention are:

• Corporate Publisher: generates reports from the repository in Word, HTML and Help file format
• Automodeler: imports and exports repository data in a variety of formats
• ITAA: A web portal to published models that required no licensing for web site users.
• Evolve: A web portal giving direct, live, access to models or users.  In recent years Corporate Modeler was rebranded as Evolve - causing much confusion as to what was Evolve!

The company CASEwise undergoes a number of transformations:

• 2011: CASEwise Asia Pacific Pty Ltd in Australia was dissolved.
• 2016: erwin acquire CASEwise including assimilating the US office and continue to develop the product. Corporate Modeler now rebadged as Evolve. CASEwise, the UK company, no longer exists.
• 2020: erwin acquired by Quest software.
• 2021: CASEwise South Africa Pty still exists and is a Quest / Erwin partner.

2015: Mark retires and says goodbye to the world of work.

Here endeth the nostalgia-fest. I am grateful to all those who contributed to the methodology ecosystem that created Corporate Modeller and kept me off the streets for many years!

Why I Hate My Mac

Because it makes me feel like a complete incompetent, an utter n00b.

On the Windows PC I am slick, proficient, productive. I am the go-to guy in our office if anyone needs help with Office. My fingers naturally curl into the three chords of Ctrl-C, Alt-Tab, Ctrl-V like Rick Parfitt belting out that good old Rock'n'Roll.

On the Mac everything is painfully slow and clunky. I have to use the mouse instead of the keyboard short-cuts and it takes multiple clicks to do things that I would normally accomplish in a few well chosen actions. I hate it. The Mac may be usable but it is not intuitive.

I know, I know it's a "training issue" and in six months time I may well be singing its praises like all the other Mac fanboys and geekgirls. But that's not the point. Right here, right now the learning curve is so steep it more resembles a brick wall. I have so much to unlearn and relearn it is dispiriting.  It was more of a shock because I love my iPhone and was hoping for a similarly pleasant experience but not so.

When my previous laptop died I decided I would finally make the switch after years of hearing how wonderful the Mac was. I was trepidatious because the one application I really needed, QuickBooks UK version, was not available for the Mac. No problem they say - use BootCamp. So I went and bought a top of the range MacBook Pro. Now bear in mind that not only have I never owned a Mac I have never even used a Mac but I did look over someone's shoulder once. And these are my initial experiences:

• First impressions OK. Switching it on the layout seemed reasonably intuitive. That row along the bottom seemed to combine the functions of the Windows Start menu and quick launch and task bar. The system tray was up the top but that was fine.
• Menu bar has moved. Clicked on a few apps and was confused by the lack of menus across the tops of the windows until I worked out that it was along the top of the screen and changed according to the active application.
• Inconsistent app installation. Used Safari to download and install Firefox no problem. Then used Firefox to download Skype and it all went pear-shaped. I ended up with some kind of disc drive icon on my desktop instead an installed application. Not a consistent experience.
• There was no driver for my HP LaserJet 1020. I tried Googling and installing an alternative driver which did not work and eventually used the driver for a different model but not after wasting quite some time - hardly plug and play.
• The serial number is written on the base in minuscule font, something like 2pt, silver on silver - only just legible with a magnifying glass a close range. Made registering for the Protection Plan difficult.
• There is no key labeled Option. This caused me some grief with Boot camp. I was asked to format the disc drive as part of the Windows install and thereafter I could only boot into Windows. With no information I had to guess what the Option key was and I guessed wrong that it was the Squiggle key. "Oh f**k", I thought, "I've gone and wiped the Mac OS! I'm going to have to go into the shop and get the bl**dy thing rebuilt." [I now know it is the alt key to the left of the Squiggle key - thank you Elizabeth]. But there was a very worrying, panic-inducing half hour.
• There is no # key. How am I supposed to use Twitter hash tags. [I now know it is Option-3].
• It only has two USB slots. So with the laser printer, the all-in-one scanner, the external back-up device, the wired mouse, the wireless transmitter for the separate keyboard, a USB stick and the iPhone for syncing I am quite a few slots short of a full set of peripherals. Fortunately I had a USB mini-hub in the drawer.
• iPhoto took control. It insisted on downloading all my photos into separate events one for each day. Excuse me I want to be in charge here. I want to decide the folder structure and which photos go where. Moving photos all into one event seemed very long-winded and inefficient. [I now know there is a merge function - thank you Helen]
• There was no equivalent of Windows explorer as far as I could see. It was several weeks until I was round at a friends house that he pointed out that it was Finder. [Thank you - Tim] The Smiley icon gave no clue, the name made me think it was a search function and using Spotlight merely reinforced that misapprehension.
• File >> Save As >> Where give a fixed list of locations so I had to save it where I was forced to and then painfully move it using Finder (now I knew what that is). Now I know to click the drop down icon next to the file name field not the where field - how unintuitive is that?

Now I have invested in a great, thick book "Switching to the Mac: The Missing Manual, Snow Leopard Edition" [Thank you - Ian]. http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/0596804253.

It's slow work though and I am very slowly creeping up the learning curve but at the moment I still hate my Mac.

2gro scam - fake virus phone call

I got a scam call from 2gro at the weekend but fortunately - despite this blog's name - I was not taken in by a cold call purporting to be from a IT help desk offering to fix a virus infection and improve the performance of my PC. The guy was very evasive about what software was doing the reporting or how anonymous fault reporting would give him my phone number. Then he wanted me to grant him remote access to my machine to diagnose and fix the supposed problem. No way! I only do that to trusted people where I have initiated the call, end of conversation, goodbye scammer, *click*.

It is extraordinary the lengths scammers will go to create the illusion of credibility:

• web site (http://www.2gro.net/)
• twitter account (http://twitter.com/2gro)
• blog or two (http://virus-spyware-removal.blogspot.com/;
  http://jennacarter.wordpress.com/)
• whole heap of press releases saying they are over these malicious rumours.

But it is all fake - smoke and mirrors. Nothing older than July 2010 even though the caller claimed they had been in business ten years. Both the office addresses are, in fact, of registration companies offering quick and cheap company formation services not real offices at all. No means of contact other than a phone number which takes you to the same call centre with the same flim-flam.

Stu Forrest's experience was exactly the same as mine:
"Received a brilliant Scam call yesterday"
"From an IT Company (www.2gro.com) suggesting that my computer had been sending warning and error messages to them, that I should go to a PC Share website, download a viewer so that they could go into my PC and show me the warning messages and make my PC run better. Read more..."

The Telegraph article explains more how these scams work
"Virus phone scam being run from call centres in India"
Britons targeted by cold callers pretending to be from Microsoft phoning to fix a fake computer problem. Beware cold callers – especially those claiming your computer has a virus. Read more..."

This has been a public service announcement :-)

iPhone currency exchange rates

The iPhone stocks seemed like the most useless of the default apps supplied until a colleague showed how you can get exchange rates as well as share prices.

Add a new "stock" by tapping the "i" (bottom right) then "+" (top left) and then search for a stock code made up of the two three-letter currency codes followed by =X. For example UK Sterling to US Dollar is GBPUSD=X, then exit gracefully back to the main screen.


iPhone stocks currency rates

What I only discovered by accident was that turning the iPhone sideways gives you the full screen version of the chart:


iPhone stocks currency rates graph

For a list of the currency codes see http://www.xe.com/iso4217.php

Flash web site is not so flash

I was chatting to Mino, an Italian chef, who was over in London for a trade show. He told me about a friend of his who had a restaurant and cookery school in London. So I whipped out my trusty iPhone, googled, clicked on www.caldesi.com and this is what I saw:


www.caldesi.com screen shot 26-March-2009

Rubbish! No text alternative. What if I had been in the area keen to call them up and make a reservation? So I dropped an email to the "design" company:

--
Tue, Mar 31, 2009
xxxxxx

When accessing http://www.caldesi.com/ on an iPhone I get, effectively, a blank screen (see attached screen shot). I guess the site would not work on a blackberry or an ordinary mobile phone either. You really should provide a low-tech html text alternative unless you think typical iPhone owners are not a suitable target demographic for a restaurant and cookery school.

And the link to your site at the bottom of the page is broken: Site design by Originator © 2009 links to http://www.caldesi.com/www.originator.co.uk - methinks someone forgot the http:// and that is how it resolves.

Regards

Mark
--

Recently I went back to check and, yes, it had changed but not really what you would call an improvement. And the link to their site is still broken.


www.caldesi.com screen shot 21-July-2009

Maybe the answer is to educate the clients as some design companies just do not seem to understand accessibility, cross-browser support, standards compliance or a user centric view of the web.

Good web design?

Occasionally I follow the link from a commercial web site to the design company that created it which is how I ended up at http://www.vohm.com/. There I was greeted with this:



Not even a "Click here for text version" or "Skip animation". Am I going to spend time downloading and installing the very latest software so I can see some flash animation? No.

Anyway it is a corporate laptop and against company policy to install unauthorised software. So I click "No" expecting the html alternative site. What I get is this:



So I click "OK" and get this:



A completely blank screen. Utterly content free. Hmmm! Would you buy web design services from this company?

Perhaps they should read: "Flash: 99% Bad" or "Top Ten Web Design Mistakes of 2005" or "Making Flash Usable for Users With Disabilities". The articles may be a couple of years old but the song remains the same. And I am sure Google would throw up a few more articles on the same theme.